Digging

I leave for a week and when I return I notice some dirt covering what used to be lawn. “Odd”, I think fleetingly on my way into my house. The next day I again notice this mis-placed dirt. After closer inspection I can tell SOMETHING has been digging a tunnel under my garage. SOMETHING has spent a fair amount of time working on this tunnel.

My mind gets going. Could this SOMETHING be a opossum? Perhaps a raccoon. Dear Lord, please don’t let it be a skunk! Please. Please. Please. I have several large rocks quite near the new hole. I could easily push one over and block the hole. It is tempting. But say it is a skunk down there and I block it in…does it just sit in there spraying until it dies? It would flood my backyard and my garage (and my car) with that sharp, awful, skunk smell.

Really even if it is a opossum or raccoon, do I really want to trap them in there until they slowly (or loudly) die. No! I could watch some night and see if SOMETHING leaves its’ new home and plug the hole with the rock. But do I really want to sit waiting for the exit of a skunk, trying not to rile it up and yet still move a large rock into place.

It baffles me. I do not know what to do. I really don’t want to pay someone to come trap it. It it is a skunk it is going to spray when it finds itself trapped and again when I walk by to be in my car.

I needed to head up to Wisconsin for the last work week of the summer up here. So I (gladly) decided to delay, postpone, ignore,and forget about this problem until my return.

In a perfect world SOMETHING would have moved out before my return. Or my wonderful neighbor, Mr. Yi would have seen SOMETHING and handled the problem himself in his own quiet way.